Image: Machida City Museum of Graphic Arts, Tokyo
Machida City Museum of Graphic Arts has highlighted Hisashi Motoda’s 'Landscape 282-01', a 2001 work depicting Gunkanjima in Nagasaki Prefecture. In the museum’s artwork introduction, the piece is presented as a representative example of Motoda’s early activity centered on the site.
The museum describes Motoda as an artist who continues to depict scenes in which modern cities and landmarks have become ruins. In that framing, his images function as what he calls “records of the past in the future,” a phrase that situates the work within his broader interest in places marked by abandonment and historical layering.
'Landscape 282-01' belongs to that line of inquiry by focusing on Gunkanjima, the former island coal-mining community whose industrial remains have long drawn artists, historians and photographers. The museum’s introduction does not expand on the work’s technique or exhibition history, but it identifies the image as one of the key pieces associated with Motoda’s early engagement with the island.
The spotlight appears as part of the museum’s ongoing artwork introduction content rather than a separate exhibition announcement. Machida City Museum of Graphic Arts, based in Tokyo, regularly shares information on works connected to printmaking and graphic arts through its institutional channels.
Motoda’s approach, as summarized by the museum, emphasizes the tension between present-day cities and the ruins they can become. By selecting a work tied to Gunkanjima, the museum places that idea in a specific historical and geographic setting, using a single artwork to point to the artist’s longer concern with how modern development leaves traces that outlast their original function.
The museum’s notice identifies the work as 'Landscape 282-01' from 2001 and links it directly to Motoda’s early Gunkanjima-related practice.
